In 2012 Servicemax received $52 million in venture capital and embarked on an International expansion plan, target launch and rapid growth initially in EMEA.

The plan was to establish an EMEA-base in the UK and quickly expand with local Sales resources in France, Germany and Benelux/Nordics.

The recently hired Sales VP had recruited 2 Enterprise AE’s in the UK, however was keen to engage a Search firm who could act quickly and effectively in hring additional EMEA AE’s, Mid Market AE, Pre Sales and Delivery resources.

We partnered with Servicemax to identify and hire the “1st on the ground” in France, Germany and Sweden, as well as Mid Market sales professionals, all of whom were experienced high-achievers.

At the time, Servicemax was a relatively unknown brand in EMEA. In addition, the Field Service Management market was an “old-fashioned”, legacy market, tied to ERP, with no SaaS players and a sector which had seen very little growth or investment over the previous decade.

Our time was spent educating the market on the value of SaaS Field Service, and why the time is right for that market to be “re-automated”, focussing on the need for disruptive technology, alignment to CRM (away from ERP, and specifically, tied to SFDC), and the fact that this represents a major growth/earning opportunity.

Having spent time understanding the culture and getting to know the key people in Servicemax, we focussed on “selling” the Servicemax brand, articulating why it is a credible opportunity, and emphasizing not only earning opportunity but also a unique culture. We invested heavily in regular F2F meetings with various factions of Servicemax to ensure we could effectively communicate the cultural element, which throughout time working with the business, has been a major factor in candidates both joining and thriving within the company.

The New Business Sales market in SaaS is highly competitive, so communicating this message has been key to our success.

After 18 months, Oakstone support Servicemax in opening up a presence in UK, France, Germany, Sweden & Holland.

In addition, we have recruited further resources in the UK, France, Germany and the US (and continue to do so).

We are currently actively working to help the business launch in APAC (Japan and Australia).